Scientists find errors in hypothesis linking solar flares to global temperature
From Physorg.com. h/t to Leif Svalgaard who offers this PDF with this diagram that makes it all clear.
In contrast to a previous analysis, a new study has shown that the distributions of (a) the global temperature anomaly by month since 1880 and (b) the solar flare index by day over a few solar cycles are fundamentally different. One feature the detrended data do have in common is self-similarity: the probability density functions are the same on different time scales, which means that neither can be described as Lévy walks. Image credit: Rypdal and Rypdal.
(PhysOrg.com) — The field of climate science is nothing if not complex, where a host of variables interact with each other in intricate ways to produce various changes. Just like any other area of science, climate science is far from being fully understood. As an example, a new study has discredited a previous hypothesis suggesting the existence of a link between solar flares and changes in the earth’s global temperature. The new study points out a few errors in the previous analysis, and concludes that the solar and climate records have very different properties that do not support the hypothesis of a sun-climate complexity linking.
In a handful of studies published in Physical Review Letters between 2003 and 2008, a team from Duke University and the Army Research Office including Nicola Scafetta and Bruce West analyzed data that appeared to show that solar flares have a significant influence on global temperature. Solar flares, which are large explosions in the sun’s atmosphere that are powered by magnetic energy, vary in time from a few per month to several per day. Although solar flares occur near sunspots, their frequency variation occurs on a much shorter time scale than the 11-year sunspot cycle. In their studies, the researchers’ results seemed to show that data from solar flare activity correlates with changes in the global temperature on a short time scale. Specifically, their analysis showed that the two time records can both be characterized by the same Lévy walk process.
However, in the new study, which is also published in Physical Review Letters, Martin Rypdal and Kristoffer Rypdal of the University of Tromso in Norway have reexamined the data and the previous analysis and noticed some shortcomings. One of the biggest causes of concern is that the previous analysis did not account for larger trends in factors that affect solar flares and global temperature. For instance, the solar cycle has its 11-year periodic trend, where periods of lots of sunspots cause larger numbers of solar flares. Likewise, the global temperature anomaly has numerous other factors (a “multi-decadal, polynomial trend”) that impacts global temperature fluctuations. By not detrending this data, the analysis resulted in abnormally high values of certain variables that pointed to Lévy walk processes. By estimating the untrended data, Rypdal and Rypdal hypothesized that the solar flare records might be described by a Lévy flight, while the global temperature anomaly might obey a distribution called persistent fractional Brownian motion.
Read the entire article here at Physorg.com
A preprint of the paper is available here
Practice making your own Levy walks here
@ur momisugly Ian W (09:59:00) :
The chaotic behavior of the system has only been seen for a very brief interval yet mathematicians without knowing the interrelationships of the variables claim they can define a pattern?
Can one use an elastic metric like GTA and base a hypothesis on a ‘polynomial’ which has terms some of which are unknown and which interact in unknown ways, that has been studied over a brief period in which some polynomials have not fully cycled?
There are tests for chaotic behavior, but they are not simple or totally accurate. Generally, they are based on knowledge or “probability” of the initial, and boundary, conditions, often derived from what is called “prior” information, meaning that which is from scientifically, and/or experimentally established relationships and data, and often as the probability of applicable behavior stated by a “expert” in the field(s) and then compared to truly random behavior.
Every tree in a forest is unique in some respect, but discerning one from the other can be difficult. We can easily spot the difference between oaks and pine even tho both are trees, but may not be able to tell one pine from another. Initial and boundary conditions must be defined in terms of the question asked. Ask a fuzzy question and you’ll get a fuzzy answer. 🙂
Jim Clarke (12:54:32) :
Why is the IPCC argument not immediately recognized as a fallacy by all reasoning people?
Because cleverly done propaganda can be very persuasive.
Yarmy (12:57:04) :
That Levy walk resembles the route I take home when returning from the pub on a Saturday evening.
If so, I’m amazed you made it home.
NickB. (13:17:43) :
Dr. Svalgaard, Where am I wrong here?
who says you are wrong?
James F. Evans (13:27:24) :
the goal should be to not assume prior theories are infalable and be open to challenges to those older theories.
This is what scientists do and are all the time. There is no greater joy than overthrowing old dogma.
Close scrutiny with reasonable skepticism and an open-mind should be applied to all scientific papers.
This is wrong. Papers are judged by their inherent merit and skepticism/open-mind has not and should not have any influence here.
From: Jim Clarke (12:54:32)
But that is the summation of the entire IPCC argument for accepting the AGW theory and making life more difficult for every man, woman and child on the planet. “Our models don’t work if we do not include greenhouse gases as the main driver of late 20th century warming, so CO2 must be the reason!” Why is the IPCC argument not immediately recognized as a fallacy by all reasoning people?
My television remote requires 2 AA batteries. Therefore only when you include 2 good AA batteries does the television work, and television programming exists at all.
The first part of the statement is considered valid by around 90% of the population, as most people have lost or never had the ability to use those funny buttons and knobs that may be present on a modern remote-equipped TV, if people know they exist at all. (And with these new flatscreens with the buttons at the rear to the side, they sure aren’t advertising they exist, and they’re barely labeled to boot.) Also, in the “all things are relative” file, if someone is not witnessing something then it does not exist. As I have said when stopping my dial-up connection, “time to shut down the internet for the night.” 😉
Let me see if I’m following along.
Scafetta and West analyzed data without de-trending it and it appeared to show that solar flares have a significant influence on global temperature. They appeared to be following the same random walk.
Rypdal and Rypdal analyzed the same data, but de-trended it and the correlation went away.
The concern is that by not de-trending the data, Scafetta and West unintentionally included factors other than solar flares in their analysis.
Correct?
@ur momisugly Jim Clarke (12:54:32) :
What scientists, technicians, engineers, etc. often fail to recognize is the hierarchy of decision making. Often, a decision must be made, at some level of responsibility, regardless of whether any data, etc. supports, is even available, or explicitly pertains. These are cultural, and/or political, etc. issues. Pay grade counts.
[quote Curiousgeorge (14:19:27) :
@ur momisugly Jim Clarke (12:54:32) :
What scientists, technicians, engineers, etc. often fail to recognize is the hierarchy of decision making. Often, a decision must be made, at some level of responsibility, regardless of whether any data, etc. supports, is even available, or explicitly pertains.
[/quote]
Engineers understand that. I’m sure scientists do too.
The problem is the green movement has a history of pushing bad ideas as solutions to over-hyped problems.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d24b56MmIts&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0]
Can the cosmic rays perhaps change the Solar Radiance photon/wave itself. There appears to be a collision, and during high sunspots, the cosmic sourced radiation doesn’t come through. So, what is the physics going on there?
Secondly, are Photons generic?
NASA describes Forbush decreases or events as declining in a matter of hours while taking a few days to increase again. There is about a 2-4 day delay from a coronal mass ejection to the Forbush decrease at Earth.
It would appear that the impact of such rapid changes would be superimposed on periodic, chaotic and Brownian motion of atmospheric and oceanic circulation which vary from hours to centuries.
Would it not require detailed high resolution measurements with hour level resolution to quantify and distinguish these features?
Leif Svalgaard said :
“Compositional change does affect the stratosphere. This does not mean that that change propagates downwards to change the surface, which is [as far as I can ascertain] what Steve Wilde claims.”
I’ve laid this canard to rest several times but Leif keeps repeating it.
It appears to be the rate of upward energy transfer that changes from layer to layer of the Earth system. I do not propose that energy is ever propagated downwards.
The evidence for varying rates of upward energy transfer is the observed differential warming and cooling of troposphere, stratosphere, and the upper layers. They never warm or cool in parallel. All seem to react differently to stimuli from above and below.
Whether the rate of energy transfer is affected wholly by events emanating at the surface (the oceans) or whether there is a contribution from solar events is the critical issue and I am open minded about it but on the balance of the evidence overall I do not feel that Leif’s level of apparent certainty is justified.
Curiousgeorge (14:19:27) :
“Often, a decision must be made…”
With no evidence of a crisis, or even a problem that can be rectified, there is certainly no need for a decision! In fact, taking aggressive action to solve a problem that does not exist is sure to make things a lot worse. Again, this seems self evident.
NickB. (13:17:43) :
If insolation did match temps we would see measurable fluctuations every 11-or-so years, and on longer cycles, that correlate with solar input.
We do see measurable fluctuations, in the rate of change, that correlate with solar input, over 11-or-so year cycles. But only within the range of temperature change that can be explained by the 11 -or-so-year cycles in TSI. These are “wiggles” in the longer ~0.6C/century rise in global temperatures; they cannot explain the long term trend itself.
How can the portion of the system (atmosphere) that contains 1/1000 of another (oceans) – note: that’s without even including net energy stored in the land surface – control all of it?
Of the energy received from the sun at the equator, most of it is transported poleward through atmospheric circulation, not ocean circulation. Winds are far more important than you given them credit for. What we see as 30-60 year climate cycles may be the result of shifts in the jet stream. When the jet stream moves poleward, winds become more zonal, with maritime winds providing more moderate (warmer) climes for the continents. When it moves back to the south, the jet stream becomes more loopy, with meridional flows bringing more continental/polar air masses to dominate continental climates. Thus atmospheric circulation can have a lot to do with climate cycles.
NickB. (13:17:43) :
Brilliant NickB!
They tell us that our climate is a fragile balance controlled by the atmosphere. Yet the atmosphere constitutes a negligible fraction of the thermal mass here.
Is it possible that the long-term internal dynamics of the climate system may be mainly due to dissipation of heat between the ocean and the atmosphere through evaporation, cloud formation and precipitation?
They tell us that our climate is a fragile balance controlled by the atmosphere.
Yet life on earth has survived millions of years with severe climate changes.
Leif Svalgaard (13:52:12) :
who says you are wrong?
Well, you’re the sun guy and when someone floats a specious theory (especially anything involving the sun) you have no trouble making your objections known… which is really another way of saying you have a critical eye and are bluntly honest (both of which are good things). I wanted to make sure what I said, at least on first glance, passed the “Leif Smell Test” as I call it, so barring additional comment I will say thank you and continue to pursue this train of thought. Much appreciated 😀
One additional note, this thinking appears to be in keeping with Beenstock and Reingewertz (WUWT Discussion, Paper). The paper examines three variables – temperature, irradiance, and GHG – and finds that changes in GHG have a temporary effect on temperature and that a 1 W/m2 change in irradiance have an effective permanent effect of 1.47 C.
Of particular interest IMO are Tables 3 and 4 in the paper. The first shows “Impulse Responses” (i.e. time effects on temperature) which for irradiance is 0 effect year 1, 1.44 C year 2, dipping back down to .75 C year 3 and then eventually trending back up to 1.47 C as the permanent effect. Table 4 – Contributions to Global Warming in the 20th Century – shows how these play out in their analysis (GHG has been increasing over the period after all).
They appear to use the same irradiance data as: Lean, J. & Rind, D. How will earth’s surface temperature change in future decades.
Geophysical Research Letters 36, 1-5 (2009) (Paper, discussion on Pielke Sr.’s site here)
Cheers!
johnythelowery (14:48:48) :
Photons generic?
Leave photons alone, will you 🙂
photons are the exchange currency for electromagnetic interactions, like money is the exchange medium for some human transactions, and are just as impervious to the nature of the transaction.
NickB. (15:33:06) :
They appear to use the same irradiance data as: Lean, J. & Rind, D.
They use the Lean 2005 series for TSI, and newer reconstructions [this is a rapidly improving field] show much less variation, c.f. the red[dish] curves on http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-recon3.png
It was thought just a few years ago that TSI had two components: one that was simply proportional to the sunspot number plus one that was a long term variation, e.g. from the Maunder minimum to today. The latter component being the largest [simply because there is no clear and large 11-yr cycle in climate]. The pendulum is swinging towards abandoning the long-term component. Even Lean is doubting that long-term variations exist. See the last line of the green text in the lower right corner of http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-LEAN2008.png [from a talk in 2008 by Lean].
@ur momisugly Jim Clarke (15:16:46) :
Curiousgeorge (14:19:27) :
“Often, a decision must be made…”
With no evidence of a crisis, or even a problem that can be rectified, there is certainly no need for a decision! In fact, taking aggressive action to solve a problem that does not exist is sure to make things a lot worse. Again, this seems self evident.
To do nothing, is also a decision. I’m not differentiating between a correct or incorrect decision with regard to any real or imagined future of this planet. As has been said: “The data do not support any conclusions at present”. Yet, decisions are being demanded and made nonetheless. Whether those decisions will ultimately benefit or harm all or any part of life on this planet has yet to be seen.
Stephen Wilde (14:53:31) :
It appears to be the rate of upward energy transfer that changes from layer to layer of the Earth system. I do not propose that energy is ever propagated downwards.
sigh. What is rate of upwards energy transfer? Joule per second [=Watt] per square meter? or what?
Stephen Wilde (14:53:31) :
I do not propose that energy is ever propagated downwards.
Right now, the Sun is warming my back. Energy seems to be coming downwards…
uhh, Leif? Where might you be located that said Sun is warming your back? Please post and I will buy a ticket to your location post haste.
Pamela Gray (16:57:53) :
uhh, Leif? Where might you be located that said Sun is warming your back? Please post and I will buy a ticket to your location post haste.
California: 38.2318 North and 122.5618 West [during breaks in the clouds:-)].
Yarmy (12:57:04) : That Levy walk resembles the route I take home when returning from the pub on a Saturday evening. Leif Svalgaard (13:52:12) : If so, I’m amazed you made it home.
Not really. Chaos is deterministic. Solar flare systems, global climate systems, and Yarmy’s staggering home are NOT random (i.e. not stochastic). Those systems may or may not be connected, but randomness is not phenomenological.
Why only use solar flare influence? Perhaps because they wanted to show an effect that would punch through the greenhouse effect (GHE) before the GHE had time to react?
Surely, the only thermal signal to reach Earth’s surface would be in the greenhouse ‘window’ anyhow.
Wow! Would this be a falsification for CO2 warming? The slowly closing ‘window’ that CO2 obscures for outgoing long-wave radiation (OLR) is also slowly closing for insolation!
GHE works both ways!
This isn’t what I was going to post, but the thought just struck me. 🙂
Best regards, suricat.
Pam: Leif’s busy….so…..um…..I’m feeling hot too!?
You are 2.2 degrees straight south of me and the sun is just now popping through the breaks.
No warmth to speak of but the Ravens bicker all day long.
But……like Hansen, CRU, Etc…..I really prefer hot models I can manipulate into being even hotter? : )